Educational Proposal
by SCWLC
Summary: Suki's concerned that Zuko's plans to help Katara aren't good enough. Fifth in the Proposal series.


Title: Educational Proposal

Author: SCWLC

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the chocolate chips on my desk, and my laptop.

Summary: Suki's concerned that Zuko's plans to help Katara aren't good enough. Fifth in the Proposal series.

Author's Notes: 'Shui' actually does mean 'water', at least according to the names website I visited. On another issue, Suki's actually kind of hard to write for me. I just have trouble getting into her head. However, I'm trying to spotlight everyone at least once, and it was Suki's turn.

If there was one thing that was truly disturbing about everything, it was the way Katara had been drifting everywhere for the past three weeks. In her head, Suki understood that Katara had been raped. That she'd suffered a horrible series of traumas and that she was still recovering. But Katara was the girl who'd never sat still, never sat silent, had always been determined and so much of a leader to that little group helping the Avatar.

Now she'd get up in the morning, let her ladies' maid dress her, drift into the dining room for breakfast, sit there silently the whole time, only responding if directly spoken to, barely eating anything. Then she'd get up, drift back out and hide in her quarters from everyone.

After the first couple days, she'd confronted Zuko about prying Katara out before she secluded herself into nunhood.

"She's got two tutors who are visiting her every day," Zuko had said. "There are things she'll have to know as Fire Lady, so I'm using them to force her to spend time with someone without having to bang on the door and drag her out. If it goes on too long, we'll do something, but Katara's too stubborn for us to try to _make_ her get out for more than meals. You know that." He'd smiled a little craftily then. "I also have a . . . backup plan."

She'd pressed for details, but he'd just told her that the backup plan wasn't going to go into effect unless Katara was still not getting better by the end of the month's trip to the capital.

So it was pure coincidence that Suki was there when it happened.

She'd curled up in bed that evening with Sokka, but he'd been snoring like a wounded platypus bear and she couldn't sleep. Eventually she got up and wandered into the hall for a walk. Passing close to Katara's suite, she saw the door opening, and, instinctively, slammed herself into the wall, just out of sight around a corner. She peeked around the corner and saw her friend cautiously looking around, clearly checking if anyone was there.

When Katara didn't spot anyone, she smiled slightly in the dimmed light of the corridor, and slipped off down the hall, moving from shadow to shadow as well as any Kyoshi warrior ever could. Suki gathered herself to follow, when she saw another shadow detach itself from the wall and start trailing after Katara.

Concerned, the warrior knew she had to follow now. Who was the third person?

Katara led the way through the ship, down past a few levels and doors Suki hadn't been near since the first, brief, tour of the ship she, Kanna and Sokka had been on. Suddenly, Katara stopped, and Suki froze in her shadow, while the other person just barely avoided being seen by darting into a doorway. _Amateur_, Suki thought in silent derision. Whoever they were, they weren't trained in stealth in the slightest.

Her friend was glancing around, clearly checking no one was watching, then opened the door in front of her, and slipped inside. A few counts passed, and the shadow, Suki was now fairly sure it was a woman, followed Katara in. Suki crept up to the door, and realised suddenly where they were. There was a ballroom in there. Their tour guide had mentioned that the ship was supposed to be a floating palace, so there had to be rooms for events as well as living quarters and a dining room. What was Katara doing in there?

Taking a risk, there was a lot of the room she couldn't see, Suki slipped inside, and crouched against the wall, getting a better look at things. On the far side of the room, there was a screen, and Suki rapidly slid through the darkness to settle behind it. If Katara had moved on somewhere, Suki had already lost her. All she could do now was wait and see.

It didn't take long however, as suddenly, in the darkness, Suki saw Katara come out of a door in the back, dragging something square and heavy, putting it down with a soft thump. She did the same thing six times, and then came back a seventh time with a handful of smaller things, which she leaned over and did something with them and the bigger things. Then she started placing the smaller things at intervals on the tables that were pressed against the walls of the enormous room.

When Katara had finished with her things, she walked to the centre of the open space, and paused. Suki waited, wondering what was happening. So far, Katara had come out to a ballroom, and had lugged a bunch of objects out that Suki couldn't identify in the dark and put them on tables, or left them to the side on the floor.

Katara's arms abruptly snapped out to the side, and an eerie blue light erupted from the things on the table, that Suki could now see were glasses. Glasses of _water_. The items Katara had dragged into the room were suddenly clearly visible in the light. They were buckets.

She was making the water glow, filling the room with a soft blue light. Suki stared through the tiny openings in her hiding place, and watched as Katara suddenly moved into a waterbending form, her element following her command.

A grin erupted on the Kyoshi warrior's face. Katara was bending. Katara had just been trying to find a quiet place to do it with no one around to bother her. One of her biggest worries had been that Sokka thought his sister had stopped bending entirely. If she'd just been doing it out of sight, that was . . . not great, but far better than she'd feared.

As always, it was beautiful to watch the water twirl and spin around her friend. Suki could see the movements of a warrior behind the dance, and contemplated offering to teach Katara some of the Kyoshi katas. It might be very interesting to see whether or how Katara could work them into her bending style.

Just as the first set finished, Suki saw movement behind Katara. She'd forgotten the second person following her friend and the warrior scolded herself for letting her guard down. Her eyes narrowed in concentration, Suki saw the movements in the darkness of one of the cloakroom doorways echoing Katara's motions. What was this?

Katara stopped, her arms twisting sharply, and the water flew back into the buckets. "This is the third time, Shui," Katara said, softly. "Why are you here?"

The shadow crept out of the cloakroom, and into the blue light Katara was still maintaining from the glasses. Suki idly wondered when Katara had figured out how to create the light that appeared when she healed to use as a light source. "My lady I-"

"Why did you follow me?" Katara asked again, gently.

Suki held her breath. This was the old Katara. A little more mature, but determined and gentle all at the same time.

"I wanted to learn how to bend," the woman said.

Katara froze. "What?"

The young woman, dressed in Fire Nation clothing, looked beseechingly at Katara. "My father was captured in a raid on the Southern Water tribe when he was just a child. He grew up in the Fire Nation. He and my mother were both servants in the house of Tsang when they met."

The water in the glasses flickered a moment, although Suki wouldn't have known about the lapse in concentration from Katara's expression and stance. "You're a water bender," Katara breathed.

"Yes," said Shui. "You don't know how happy I was when I heard I was when the Fire Lord informed me I was to be the personal maid to waterbending Master Katara." She stepped forward, clearly anxious. "I tried to learn from watching the firebenders," she said. "I tried so hard to learn – but fire doesn't work like water and there weren't any other benders who could teach me."

Katara seemed frozen in indecision. Suki crossed her fingers. This was what Katara needed. She needed someone to need her. Someone who would really remind her friend what it was she'd fought so hard for. Katara had once told Suki the story of how she'd had to fight a bending master just for the right to learn. She couldn't turn this Shui down, Suki prayed. She just _couldn't_.

"Alright," Katara told the woman. "Come out here, and let's get you started with a few forms you can practice on your own."

There was no way for Suki to sneak out without being seen, so she settled in and watched the whole lesson. Shui was no prodigy, she didn't pick things up the way Aang had, but Katara was patient, and Shui seemed hardworking. A few hours later, the Fire Nation bender was slowly moving through a simple form, the water following her in the first steps to the graceful dance her new teacher managed so effortlessly.

The two women ended the lesson, agreed to meet the next night and cleaned up the space. Once they'd both left, Suki picked herself up and headed back to bed.

She woke later than usual the next morning, and was a little surprised before she recalled the very late night she'd had. She was smiling while Sokka bounced around, whining about how food was waiting and would she hurry up? She smiled all the way to the dining room, through the meal, even when Katara drifted in, looking like a shadow of herself and drifted back out again.

Sokka's face was buried in his pile of meat, Suki knew better than to expect him to notice anything until later. Zuko was another matter. Kanna had left with Iroh, the two having developed a cheerful friendship that Suki thought was adorable and Sokka and Zuko clearly thought was appalling. So it was just the three of them at the table when Zuko demanded, "What is so amusing? You've been smiling all morning."

"I was just thinking about something," Suki said, happily being cryptic.

"What about?"

She fixed the Fire Lord with a look, "I was just thinking about Shui. She wouldn't happen to be your backup plan, would she?"

Zuko's eyes narrowed a little, and he said, "She might have something to do with it. Why?"

Sokka let out a loud burp and mumbled something that sounded vaguely like the word, 'meat'. Suki squinched her eyes shut and resisted the urge to hit her husband with one of her fans. Or just her fist. Zuko looked faintly nauseated. They exchanged looks. Hers said, _Why do I put up with this?_ His said, _You married him, you got yourself into this_.

The boomerang boy was finally coming up for air, so Suki decided to finish the conversation quickly. The last thing Katara needed at this particular moment was Sokka blundering in and making her feel self-conscious. "I was just thinking, last night, that it was a great backup plan."

Zuko froze, looking slightly confused, and then he understood what Suki was telling him. About Katara and about the night before. A grin broke out on his face, and he said, "It does pay to take an interest in the servants. I knew something was up when a Fire Nation servant had a name that meant 'water'."

"Whu?" said Sokka, who'd come out of his food-induced trance.

"Nothing, Sokka," they chorused. "Let's go," Suki told him. "I feel like enjoying the weather." She left, pulling him with her. Glancing back, she caught a glimpse of Zuko doing what appeared to be an incredibly goofy victory dance. She left him to it.


End file.
